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Morning Reading List, 07.29.08

Good Morning Washington. Above, one of the magazines in Frank Luntz’s collection.

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We’ve got your morning mix of media Muesli after the jump…

It’s the birthday of Garance Franke-Ruta and Jeff Patch. Five years ago, the Red Sox’s Bill Mueller became the first player in baseball history to hit grand slams from both sides of the plate in a single game. It’s the birthday of Nancy Kassebaum Baker, Marilyn Quayle, Ken Burns and Elizabeth Dole. If you were on a desert island with only one publication to keep you informed about what’s happening on Capitol Hill, Roll Call would be your Hill pub of choice. Today’s “Angry Journalist” rant of the day: “The pay is poor, the editors dictatorial and working conditions abysmal — but at least my family and neighbors get to see my byline and photo in the paper on a regular basis. That makes it all worthwhile. I’m mad as hell, but apparently, I AM going to take it some more.” Check out today’s White House Photo of the Day from Time.

Washington Post’s Howard Kurtz reports, “In a survey of Washington movers and shakers, nearly half of Republicans and more than a third of Democrats say they don’t watch the Sunday talk shows that are based here. A quarter of Democrats and a fifth of Republicans tune in every week.”

PBS Ombudsman Michael Getler writes, “Monday night, July 21, during a segment of the NewsHour with Jim Lehrer, when Max Boot, a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations and informal adviser to Sen. John McCain’s presidential campaign, appeared as a guest in a discussion about the differing plans for Iraq and Afghanistan offered by McCain and his Democratic rival, Sen. Barack Obama. Along with Boot, was Lawrence Korb, a former assistant secretary of defense in the Reagan administration and now a senior fellow at the Center for American Progress and an informal adviser to Obama’s campaign. The NewsHour’s Margaret Warner moderated the segment. When it was over, Korb and Warner had been essentially “walked over” by Boot, who rather thoroughly dominated — in terms of air time (more than 3-to-1 by my calculations) â€” the 10-minute discussion.”

The Patriot News reports, “Hardball’s’ Chris Matthews won’t discuss a run for Senate, but the prospect has others talking”

Los Angeles Times’ Top of The Ticket reports, “Exclusive! Way too many Obama TV exclusives this week”

TVNewser’s Chris Ariens reports, “The NYPost’s Adam Buckman weighs in on the what-if-Leno-goes-to-ABC scenario, and what might become of the network’s late night lineup.”

The Christian Science Monitor reports, “An MSNBC contest will pick two amateur reporters this week to cover the party conventions.”

TVNewser reported yesterday, “As FNC anchor Greta Van Susteren arrives in Beijing, back in the U.S., On the Record is getting the O’Reilly Factor-consecutive months treatment today. An ad touting ‘#1 for 75 consecutive months,’ appears in the New York Post and New York Times today.”

The Los Angeles Times reports, “Cable talking heads accuse broadcast networks of liberal bias — but a think tank finds that ABC, NBC and CBS were tougher on Barack Obama than on John McCain in recent weeks.”

A release announced, “The National Association of Black Journalists (NABJ) named FOX News, columnist Pat Buchanan, and news organizations with little to no diversity in its political coverage the 2008 recipients of the Thumbs Down Award. The award is given annually to an individual or organization for especially insensitive, racist or stereotypical reporting, commentary, photography or a cartoon at odds with the goals of NABJ.”

Dan Mitchell writes in a letter to Romenesko, “Events in recent weeks have shown, as if any more proof were needed, that blind ideology turns otherwise smart people — left and right — into blithering idiots. The latest batch of offenses to common sense shows that the left may be even more prone to this than is the right. It often seems as if the current iteration of the right knows better, but — in a conscience-free sort of way — doesn’t care. But many on the left often just don’t seem to want to acknowledge obvious facts, seeing them perhaps as impediments to a Higher Truth. First, we had the reaction to the New Yorker’s brilliant, biting takedown of the right-wing’s fantasies regarding Barack Obama. Whom did it anger? Not people on the right, but many people on the left, who, insisting upon denying reality, called it ‘offensive’ — to Obama!”

The New Republic reports, “Obama stands atop the National Journal rankings as the most liberal member of the Senate. But that just means that National Journal’s much-ballyhooed rankings are deeply flawed. How did Obama, like John Kerry four years ago, achieve this awkward distinction? There are a few different things going on here.”

The American Spectator’s Mark Gauvreau Judge writes, “Rarely does an opportunity for payback come with such delicious irony. But the truth is, the fact that The Night of the Gun: A Reporter Investigates the Darkest Story of His Life–His Own, the new book by David Carr, is repetitive, self-serving and dull, brings me no joy. This despite the fact that almost exactly ten years ago, when Carr was the editor of the Washington City Paper, he ran a hit piece on me and a book I had just published.”

The AP reports, “They want you, they need you, they lose interest, they leave you for someone else. So goes the media’s approach toward the president. It is always a relationship destined to end. President Bush — remember him? He has long ceased to be a hot story. Across all forms of mainstream media, news coverage of the president has fallen significantly this year.”

Los Angeles Times’ Top of The Ticket reports, “Fresh off his visit to three European capitals, where cheering crowds greeted his every move, Sen. Barack Obama spoke on Sunday to journalists attending Unity ’08 in his hometown of Chicago. The conference brought together members of the National Assn. of Black Journalists, the Asian American Journalists Assn., the National Assn. of Hispanic Journalists and the Native American Journalists Assn., and Obama’s remarks were broadcast live on CNN. Concern that an enthusiastic reaction to Obama’s nationally televised remarks might be viewed as unprofessional led conference organizers to send out an e-mail to 6,800 attendees, urging restraint”

Chicago Sun-Times’ Mary Mitchell writes, “If you thought Sen. Barack Obama would have an easy time before an audience of journalists of color Sunday, think again. In his first public appearance since returning from a whirlwind international trip Saturday night, Obama was put on the defensive.”